Archive for July, 2010

Poor wee Owen. As if a throat and ear infection isn’t enough to cope with, Mummy then decided that his favourite comforter was too germ ridden and needed a wash. And then had the gall to try and put him to bed without it! You what?!

Bunny Babbit is usually in Owen’s cot and is usually cuddled as he goes to sleep. Last night though, he was in the washing machine getting dizzy and I felt like such an awful Mummy watching Owen searching his cot for him. No matter how many other teddies I gave him, the crying continued until finally he managed to get to sleep. Normally we put Owen in his cot and he may gurn for a wee minute but that’s it, last night he was crying like the world was ending. It wasn’t enjoyable!

Tonight it didn’t take as long, although he was obviously looking for Babbity. I think it helped that he decided he wanted to go find Daddy who was upstairs so climbed the entire staircase! I was close behind him but he managed the whole of the stairs on his own – must have helped tire him out!

Health wise, he is definately getting over his infection. Seems a lot happier. However, I did have to give a parental signature today for his first Accident Report at nursery. Poor wee chap! He and one of the wee ones both wanted the same toy, and it ended up giving him a wee cut on his chin as they fought over it. Apparently he hardly cried about it but it was bleeding for a wee while. I’m quite glad I missed his first blood – not an essential “first” to be part of! I probably would have cried more than he did!! Talking of nursery, it was so sweet when I went in with him this morning. 3 of the wee ones came over to the door to say hello to him and one wee girl even brought him a yellow ball, was so sweet!! He did look like he might cry when I was leaving though – makes such mixed emotions, you don’t want them to be unhappy but you do like that they want you with them! He did look pleased when I collected him tonight, started waving at me with a huge grin as soon as he saw me! He’s just mastering waving as a concept so every wave seems special! As we got home we had a chat to one of the neighbours and as she was saying goodbye to him he did a 2 handed wave, which I hadn’t seen him do before, it was really cute!! It may have been his wave of approving her suggestion that she babysit for us sometime – at least I may persuade myself of that now that the new A Team movie is out….oooooh!

I think I blogged yesterday during Owen’s afternoon nap. Normally he naps for up to an hour, morning and afternoon. Yesterday it was 1.5 hours in the morning, and 2 (that’s TWO!) hours in the afternoon! If I hadn’t been distracted by someone threatening me with legal action, which was all a bit disturbing and upsetting, I might have been a bit panic stricken. However sleep is often the best cure and he did wake up with a smile and seem a lot better for it.

He slept well last night as well, except a bit of gurning about 4am. A couple of times I nearly went through with his sugar free paracetamol but then he went quiet again, so I just left it. I don’t think we were awake longer than half an hour. After our day off I’d apparently forgotten to set my alarm clock, so it was very kind of him to wake up 2 minutes before it normally goes off – and then to go back to sleep whilst I had my shower and breakfast. Bless him, he’s so well trained and knows our routine so well! When I went in to get him up he seemed his usual self, smiling and happy. He’s not quite back to normal but there was no crying this morning, until we got to nursery and I went to leave. Apparently he wasn’t too much extra trouble at nursery, just a bit sensitive and wanted extra attention. Quite understandable for a wee sickboy really!

On the bus home he was charming ladies, young and old with his smiles, and I think there were even a couple of waves (waving is still a new and not quite mastered skill). I was sat next to a bearded man who was saying hello to him – well I think Owen grabbed at him, as he’s prone to do. Anyone sat near us is obviously there for his entertainment. Anyway part way up the road the man took Owen’s hand and rubbed it on his beard. Owen looked rather unsure, so he did it again. We then got the most hilarious facial expressions – it was as if he was smiling and grimacing at once, in the most adorable way. He would move away and then reach up for another touch of it and the face would appear again. Most of the people on the bus, well at the front as it was a bendy bus, were laughing at him as well. It really was quite hilarious – and it was lovely afterwards as well as several people said goodbye to Owen as they got off the bus – and he loves attention and being waved at. Quite a tonic for me too after a stressful few days!

So Owen is ill. I mentioned at the weekend that he wasn’t quite right. We thought it was just teething as he does now have 4 teeth. But no, yesterday I had the first phone call from the nursery. They were asking if they could give him sugar free paracetamol, which I of course agreed to. When I collected him Angela said even the other children were giving him funny looks as they are not used to him crying. The medicine had helped but he was certainly not himself.

Usually on the bus he’s standing on my lap, watching and smiling at everyone and everything, this time he just sat on my lap and did the sleeping with his eyes open thing. No one got smiles. We got into the house and I put him on the floor to take his jacket and shoes off – usually this is when he shoots off to play with toys. Nope, just sat there and looked sad. Poor teething baby I thought and made his dinner. He cried through much of that. Daddy took him for his bath whilst I popped to Asda to get some more sugar free paracetamol from the Minor Ailments Service so we could take a bottle to nursery. When I came home they were obviously still bathing Owen. Then when Bryan lifted him out he started crying. It seemed that picking him up hurt, and he seemed to be reluctant to move his right hand. We took him downstairs and tried to get him to crawl. Nothing. Right, that’s just not right, time to phone the doctor. I really love NHS 24, I wish we never had to use it but they are so lovely and helpful – well apart from when I mentioned his arm and there were questions about trauma and I could tell they thought we’d abused him and hurt his arm. Yikes. I was told we had to see a doctor that night, which I was actually quite relieved by as Owen was obviously in a lot of discomfort. They phoned us back with an appointment at G Docs, the out of hours clinic, at 8.10pm. So off we all trundled, Owen in his PJs wondering why we were in the car at bedtime.

The doctor gave him a through examination and declared he had a ear and throat infection. The arm thing must just be that achy feeling you get with flu, think we all know how rotten that feels, poor wee mite. The really interesting thing she told us is that when a baby is ill it often regresses back a step so because crawling is a new thing to Owen he will have stopped doing it as he’s ill, not necessarily because it hurts to lean on his arm as we were afraid it seemed to be.

She gave us a prescription and told us we had 15 minutes to get to Sainsburys before the pharmacist shut – off we raced. Got there in time – and they didn’t have any of the stuff we needed! DOH! They also told us all pharmacists in Aberdeen shut at 9pm. Drat. Owen was so tired with it being 2 hours past bedtime that he was asleep before I got back to the car in a strop. So we went home and put him to bed, when he woke up gurning near bedtime we gave him some sugar free paracetamol – and he slept right through till 7.45! Bless him!

I arranged to be off work today once he was in bed and arranged with Bryan that one of us would go to Asda pharmacy at 8am and get his prescription before Bryan went to work. Sorted. Until I got to Asda and the pharmacy opened at 9, I’m sure it said 8 on the website! Grrr!

At least it gave Owen and I a reason to go for a walk and get him some fresh air, maybe not ideal to do before his breakfast but he napped most of the way there and back so it was fine. Today mostly he has napped, eaten, and of course, taken drugs.

He does seem to be quite a bit better already, when I phoned nursery this morning they said usually 2 doses of the medication is all it takes for them to bounce back so I’m hoping when he wakes up from the current afternoon nap he will be feeling quite a bit better. His naps have certainly been longer than normal today so I’ve managed to answer work emails and do some household chores.

Fingers crossed we’re through the worst of it. Its horrid watching your wee one suffer and not being able to “fix it”. Listening to an album of Disney songs on Spotify has helped, I even let him watch a bit of TV as sitting still seems to be his favourite thing. The cats have been giving him attention too which is nice and has made him smile a couple of times. They have each had a good brush during his naps so they seem quite chuffed I’m off work, George is curled up asleep beside me now, I did wonder if they missed me now my maternity leave is over. Expect they like the peace and quiet though really!

I’m having a nice weekend. We had no plans so declared it was a weekend of nothing. It has been most nice, just spending time with my favourite boys. We have managed to do quite a few chores, I cut the grass and Bryan cooked 29 meals for Owen and baked some bread, for example. Had some of the bread as it came out of the oven with some home made raspberry jam one of the solicitors from my work gave me – was heavenly! Bryan and I also managed to get a little drunk on Friday night with some wine left over from a function at work, and last night we had fajitas and Corona – the perfect dinner partners! Mostly we’ve been playing with Owen, he’s really got that crawling thing down to a T, he’s even been working on the climbing of stairs (no video as yet, its really all hands on the baby thing!). *30th July – video now available, just click here.*

He can kind of say “Dada”, “Yes”, “Hiya” and he sometimes does a “Ta” when you give him something or take something away from him. He understands more words than he can say, the smile if you mention “Petite Filous” at the end of a meal is quite lovely. Even today – he’s not quite himself this weekend, so its good we didn’t have many plans. He’s teething at the moment – now got 2 on the top to match the 2 on the bottom – but he’s also got a cold. Not sure if its those 2 things that are adding to his usual pooping problems but he seems to be in even more discomfort than normal – and now his ears seem to be hurting too so he doesn’t want to eat as the ears and teeth must make eating quite uncomfortable. Luckily we’re still managing to persuade him but its quite exhausting trying to keep him cheery and willing right through a meal. Poor wee toot! At least he slept in the last 2 mornings so I was able to sleep past 7am for a change, not by much but that’s fair enough!

Talking of the teething – he’s been really cute the last few days wanting to see my teeth, obviously trying to work out what’s going on in his mouth. He likes to feel them and and flick his fingers over them, really quite funny, when not sore!!

Owen even has an admirer, an older girl at nursery called Hannah who rushes over to give him a bosie every morning when I drop him off. Of course we have to be careful as he is already bethrothed to the lovely Lydia – and she’s much nearer his age anyway! Just a shame she lives in England, way south, and we’ve only met her and her Mum online!

Of course Owen’s 9 months old so Dad thought it was time he started taking a turn at driving us all to work/nursery in the morning.

Yesterday we all went out in the car, to the excitement that is the supermarket. Owen is quite happy to sit in the trolley’s seat and look at everything going by.. Well, most of the way round – we have to carry him some of it when Bryan takes a while with his shopping but that’s not too much of a chore really! I had almost put a changing mat on the shopping list as the second hand one I got from Freecycle has started to split at the seams, but I thought we could just make do rather than spending money. Anyway walking through the baby section in Tesco, what do we see? A Finding Nemo changing mat! It’s fate! This is the finishing touch to the Nemo themed nursery! So yes, I may have put something non-essential in the trolley. Oops. But he loves it so who cares about the expense?! The only downside is that its now even harder to get him to lay on his back and keep still so we can change him!

Talking of Disney, since Owen was born I’ve now entered 2 competitions to win a family holiday to Florida/Orlando/DISNEY!!! I can imagine there will be many more over the next few years but I will state now that by hook or by crook we will go one day. Bryan’s passport ran out the year we were married and now, 7 years later, we’ve finally renewed it – so that’s the first step! Owen does now have a savings account as I mentioned we were planning a while ago, and his Child Benefit is going into it each month, and will continue to do so for as long as we can afford to do that. We also put any monetary presents he is given in there – even when its just a wee amount, like one day this week when a lovely man gave him £1 on the bus for being so well behaved!! We’ll do what we can to save up so the 3 of us can go when Owen’s about 5, and can appreciate it. Of course if I win it before that we’ll happily go sooner!! I’ve wanted to go to Disney World for as long as I can remember. Have realised now that it will be even more magical to go with my own child so I’m glad I’ve waited this long to go. Bryan did take me to Disneyland Paris when he worked for Disney Store and got a discount but that’s just not the same. We did have a cool time but it didn’t stop me wanting to go to Disney World!

Anyway, that’s the weekend nearly over so I’d better shut up about my weekend! Hope you had a nice one too.

Well Owen is now 9 months old, that’s 3/4 of a year. He’s been outside as long as he was in! So what stage is he at? Well… he has 3 teeth; he loves pulling himself up to standing and today managed to stand twice without holding anything (for a very short period, but still!); he can move from lying to sitting to standing and back down again on his own(as long as there’s something to hold for the standing bit); he sleeps 7pm-6 or 7am and knows he doesn’t get up till 7.30; he eats just about anything you put in front of him (yesterday he enjoyed some BBQ food, today was home made sun dried tomato bread, although refused lovely fresh raspberries); he loves nursery and is quite happy being left there in the morning, but gets excited when collected as well; he can say Dada and seems to know this is Bryan, he also gives you things and says Ta; he loves bubbles and dancing and Petit Filous. Generally he is a wonderful and amazing wee guy, but I have been told I may be biased. Now he is so mobile he can be a bit akward, especially when trying to change his nappy or bath him! It is great that he’s so keen and able but sometimes it would be a lot easier if he just lay there!!

Anyway here’s a wee pic of him on this momentous day, its rather nice that George cat is in the background as today is the 3 year anniversary of him and Benson coming to live with us as well. I love all my boys, am so lucky to have the four of them to live with!

So says one of Owen’s t-shirts, and last weekend I really proved it right. At last it was time for my Christmas present from Bryan. I had had it in my possession for some time but the wee bit of paper wasn’t doing much for me, despite its shiny hologram, except for giving me a great sense of anticipation. So what was the present – a weekend camping T in the Park ticket obviously! As many of you will know, I go most years. I did miss the first 2 years, then I think the year before we got married as I was saving for the honeymoon, last year I was pregnant so decided against it and the year before that we were saving up to start a family so I was good then too. Several times I have said “this year is my last”, and I have said that a few times in the past couple of weeks it must be said. Well, we’ll see huh?!

This year as well as the fact that I didn’t pay for my ticket (thanks Bryan, love you!) I also got wonderful accommodation. My dear cousin Lynne had offered me space on her floor in Kinross when I said I was going. She then bought a new house – in Newburgh, in January! Whilst I was happy for her to have a lovely new house I was slightly distraught at where I would sleep – I really am too old/boring to be in a field with a load of drunken folks! Anyway as time wore on the flat in Kinross wasn’t selling, so I eventually put on my “if you don’t ask you don’t get” cheeky hat and asked Lynne what she thought. So Lydia and I had a lovely dry flat to live in for the weekend, with running water, a clean toilet, a fridge and a shower. Hurrah! T in the Park is lovely enough to provide a free bus to and fro Kinross so we were sorted! We did walk out to the field on the Friday in case the bus didn’t work out, thinking it was easier to find the route in the daylight, but after that we bussed back and forth.

Lydia and I were most pleased that we only saw one person each with wellies the same as ours. I love my peacock feathers!

Highlights of the weekend were: Mumford and Sons, Calvin Harris, Kasabian, dancing to Eminem’s Loose Yourself in The Moment in a big open space with Lydia in the dark, watching some girls mud wrestling (nearly peed myself laughing!) and a very nice pie and chips that just hit the spot!

Being old and boring I was most impressed at the caring additions that T in the Park had made to previous years: folk walking round with free water and fruit, the picnic tables where we managed to sit at for each of our meals, laminated pouches for tickets so they didn’t get dog eared and soggy, and hand sanitisers near each block of toilets. The toilets seemed to stay rather usable and supplied with toilet paper all weekend – we only had one bad experience but that was a back corner row of 8 cubicles that didn’t have supervisors watching over them – we should have guessed and ran away rather than using them and nearly puking!!!! There is also now a Healthy T area with local, good food. We ate in the main arena for our first meal and then found the special fenced off bit – and didn’t eat anywhere else for the rest of the weekend! I had an amazing Roast lamb with rosemary and thyme roll (wholemeal of course) with salad and homemade coleslaw one time and yummy lamb stovies another. There was also an orgasmically good chocolate muffin at one point…

I thought it was good on the Saturday how the main bands were staggered – so we managed to see just about everyone we wanted, Sunday they were more similar times so this wasn’t so easy to do. This is always a problem for me – wanting to see everyone that is on and being limited by the time/space issues. When 3 different stages have bands you want to see on at the same time it is logistically impossible to see them all and so you have to miss someone out (sorry Ash! I wanted to see you but just couldn’t! And Faithless and Prodigy).

Talking of problems with music – what was up with the sound system?! NME and Main Stage both seemed to have issues all through the weekend. You won’t have known if you watched on TV as of course the camera was right there but we could hardly hear Florence and the Machine and there were others that were bad too. Biffy Clyro were painful to hear from where we were, so we left – we’re seeing them in November anyway and were actually getting to the point of thinking we should sell our tickets!

This year there were some lovely colourful flags on the stage between Main Stage and King Tut’s tent. Although they were really nice to look at they were awful in the wind and it was terribly windy early on, on the Sunday. We were sat at a picnic table under the flags for lunch listening to The View – or rather trying to! You actually couldn’t hear the band over the noise of the wind in the flags. Gutting! Unfortunately the wind also meant the wee screens to each side of the main stage had to be taken down, well I presume that’s why they went down low and then went back up later. This was a shame too as you couldn’t see the performers so well, but understandable in the wind!

The weather was very mixed, Friday it rained as we drove down but was dry all the time we were outside. Saturday started off raining but dried up before I got soaked through! We did start to feel a bit miserable at one point but went to the Ceilidh Tent and got warm and dry – and discovered a fab band called Skerryvole! I do love a man in a kilt, as you maybe know, and I am always in awe of anyone playing the pipes as I failed miserably at learning to play just the chanter! Sunday was dry but windy – and it got a bit too sunny for my liking, I do burn easily!

Anyway that’s a wee overview of our weekend, could wax lyrical about the bands we saw but that would just bore most of you so suffice to say I had a fab time and really enjoyed myself, just disappointed about some of the sound quality – after all it is the music I go for!

Well the boy has obviously been growing up! He now weighes 1.5 stone and is nearly into 1 year clothes! He has been wearing 9-12 months clothes for quite some time so I guess its not surprising but he is still only 8.5 months old, bless the wee lump!

I’ve started buying clothes for him. We’ve been really lucky and been given a lot of hand me downs and presents so far so we’ve not actually needed to buy him any clothes. We did buy him a couple of things but now we’re going to have to buy everything as the hand me downs are drying up! Knew this would happen as he gets older and sizes last longer – at least we get the chance to get our money’s worth out of stuff from now on apparently. Anyway I’m taking advantage of any vouchers and special offers I can – is a fun challenge to see what barguins I can get!

So what have we been up to? Well before I went back to work we used to go to Kids & Co every Tuesday morning (babies play, Mummies gossip!) and Mainly Music every Wednesday morning (singing and dancing and having a fab time!). Both groups were at our local church, neither was very religious but it was nice to feel part of the community and to see the same lovely folk each week. In the modern way, I added as many as possible on Facebook so we can keep in touch now I’m back at work. The last couple of weeks I was able to take Owen to Jo Jingles which started up in our area. This is another music group but instead of all singing and dancing together each child sits on its own mat and gets given various things to play with.

Owen loved both music classes and I’ve always sung to him quite a bit – hence him learning how to clap his hands!Video here if the embedded version doesn’t work!

We went to a Bookstart Rhymetime in our local Library and Owen got his first Library Card. Proud Librarian Mummy! Not that I’ve let him borrow any books yet as he tends to suck them lots and so I only let him do it to his own books.

Other than that our days were made up of going for walks, doctors check ups, and visits from friends. Lunches out were managed occassionally although any leaving the house seemed like a huge mission back then! What to take? What would Owen do? Would we get home safely? Quite funny looking back on it now when I jump on a bus with him every day to get home from nursery!

We had a family holiday – well a long weekend in Edinburgh. My lovely friend Jennie let us use her flat to stay in so we had a fridge and cooker which made it easier with Owen. We bought a travel cot so he slept in that in our room, he’s such a good sleeper it wasn’t a problem all sharing a room again. Other than I had a cough so risked disturbing him! I got some medicine on the way down from the Minor Ailments Service at the local pharmacists so that helped! Of course that was mid May and its the cough I’m still suffering from! Was lovely to catch up with our Hillside buddies, and I took Owen into my old work to show him off.

An amazing thing happened on Friday 28th May – Nicole and I actually had an evening together, just the two of us, with no husbands and no babies. Much as we love them it was nice to have some girlie time together, just the 2 of us. We couldn’t remember the last time it had happened but hopefully it will happen again soon – ooh must see about arranging that! We spent some time getting “prettified” and then went out for dinner. It was a really lovely night – and we did scrub up nice!

I’ve already blogged about going back to work. Its still going well, with Owen still loving nursery so that’s cool. My trip to Brighton was great, the conference was really good and the night out was awesome. My usual “posse” was quite depleted at the conference so I did that networking thing and made some new friends which was good. I may have also been snapped by the official photographer drinking Champers before noon with James! Check out my cool bag though! @Jaffne made me it, she’s so cool! You can see some of her craftiness here.

The night out with Twitter folks was really good, apparently after speaking to folk for about 3 years you do know them quite well, even if you’ve never met them. I have some utterly awesome friends, just a shame Brighton is so far away! A couple of them that I was looking forward to meeting didn’t make it but one special chap I didn’t think was coming did so that was fab. You know who you are folks!

And yes, I went on the Carousel – twice – once with a Law Librarian Carousel-Virgin and once with 2 Twitter chums. Hurrah!